


Salad Days

by proprioception (sacrificethemtothesquid)



Series: Shrapnel [7]
Category: Mad Max Series (Movies)
Genre: Gardening, Gen, innuendos, suggestive vegetables
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-04
Updated: 2017-08-04
Packaged: 2018-12-10 21:23:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,024
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11700156
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sacrificethemtothesquid/pseuds/proprioception
Summary: The lingering influence of Joe’s obsession with fertility collides with Vuvalini frankness like a stormfront hitting a brushfire. It’s a cult of male prowess and a bunch of raunchy old ladies, and Max is starting to wish meals weren’t communal.





	Salad Days

**Author's Note:**

> lifted directly from a conversation on slack regarding a tomato. sorrynotsorry

It starts with the zucchini.

No one but the Keeper knew exactly which seeds were which in the old leather bag, but Dag plants them all, carefully sorting them out by type and then meticulously documenting which ones produced what type of sprout. There are two weighty tomes in the Vault along with a handful of yellowed magazines, and she pores over the pictures and descriptions, intent on finding names and information about the precious seedlings.

Once she decides what they are and where they should go, the seedlings get transferred to a spot on the terraces with northern exposure and a dedicated irrigation line. “Bountiful production,” Dag reads out. “Should be good, yeah?”

None of them expect the zucchini.

The plants all but explode. The combination of sun and water and rich fertilizer is a magic elixir, and the garden crew watches wide-eyed as the leaves grow exponentially every day. “They’re so happy!” Cheedo says, clapping her hands. “These are good ones!”

The flowers are the size of a human palm, a bright yellow-orange that’s startling and beautiful against the healthy green of the leaves, and the garden crew reverently spreads the pollen with their tiny brushes. The fruit start out small, like thick green fingers hidden at the base of the stalks.

“How do we know when they’re ripe?” Capable asks. “Do they change color?”

“This just says they get big,” Dag says, flipping through the magazine. She points to a faded picture, a basket of strange vegetables, but it’s impossible to tell the scale. “Dunno _how_ big.” Bigger means more food for everyone, so they agree to wait.

And then one morning, Cheedo goes out to check, and the zucchini have gotten _huge._

The first one she brings in is half the length of her forearm, long and glossy with just enough curve to be utterly obscene. Dag takes one look at it, and breaks out in a huge grin that’s just about the most terrifying expression Max has ever seen. “ _Schlanger,_ ” she crows, and Cheedo’s eyes go huge and delightedly scandalized.

It is, Max reflects, the beginning of the end.

 

****

 

The lingering influence of Joe’s obsession with fertility collides with Vuvalini, er, _frankness_ like a stormfront hitting a brushfire. It’s a cult of male prowess and a bunch of raunchy old ladies, and Max is starting to wish meals weren’t communal.

Cheedo considers a small cucumber. “This one doesn’t look big enough.”

“It’s not the size that matters,” Capable says.  

“It’s never as big as they say it is,” Toast points out, and all three dissolve into giggles.

 

****

 

Then comes the tomato. It’s small, a variety the book helpfully calls “cherry”, which mystifies everyone because a cherry is a tree? But also a tomato?

Regardless, this cherry-tomato in question is perfectly round, but some accident of growth has given it a long protuberance that is...decidedly eager.

“Better eat this one,” Amy says, sliding it across the table to Max. She winks at Furiosa. “Bolsters the stamina.”

Hopefully, Max thinks, the floor will open up and swallow him.

“Every harvest,” Furiosa says later, when they’re alone in her (their) room, safely away from any produce, suggestive or otherwise. “Every. Single. One.”

He swallows.

“And there were more of them.” Her expression is that of a weary veteran who’s seen far, far too much. “More vegetables. More mothers. So many more.”

 

****

 

As the crops mature, the conversation...does not. He’s heading somewhere else when he encounters Dag carrying a particularly large zucchini down from the terraces. It’s big, but it’s not _that_ big, and she doesn’t _have_ to hold it the way she is, grotesquely swinging at her waist. She bobs her eyebrows at him, and he hurries off in the opposite direction.

“There used to be a contest,” Maadi reminisces at dinner.

Cheedo frowns, somehow still an innocent in this den of iniquity. “A contest?”

“More like a competition,” Mari says. “The entries themselves were the best prize.”

“You had to grow it yourself,” Amy agrees. “No cheating. No grafting.”

“Except that one time Keeper managed to graft three cucumbers-”

“She didn’t graft them! She found them that way!”

“Sure, that’s what she _told_ you.”

“I don’t understand,” says Cheedo.

Max elects not to explain.

Dag has a small yellow zucchini in her hand and casually puts one end in her mouth. Toast chokes on her water, and has to be slapped on the back, tears of mirth streaming from her eyes.

Furiosa looks like she'd rather be _anywhere_ else.

 

****

 

The vegetables don’t stop, and neither do the innuendos. A conjoined tomato comes in, each globe perfectly round and smooth. “That’s going to be the butt of a few jokes,” says Capable.

“Don’t _ass_ ume,” Toast says.

“Just _anal_ yzing.”

“Well, get to the bottom of it.”

Furiosa shakes her head and pushes away from the table. “I’m not hungry anymore.”

“Probably tastes like ass anyway,” Dag says dismissively.

“Hey,” Toast says. “I used ass already. Yours doesn’t count.”

 

 ****

 

 At the communal table, a dish is passed around. The tubers are long and thick, sliced into juicy wedges. Maadi offers it to Furiosa with a wicked smile. “Can I interest you in some chopped-”

“When we’re eating them,” Furiosa grinds out, “please, _please_ just call them carrots.”

Mari clicks her tongue in disapproval, and leans toward Max. “She was just like this as a teenager.”

He can’t imagine why.

Dag has a bowl of mixed greens and watches as he adds a pile to his plate, her eyes large and innocent. “If you ask her, maybe Furiosa will toss your salad?”

He feels himself going as red as the tomato that’s currently resting in the lettuce.

“I can kill you,” Furiosa says.

“No murder at the dinner table,” Amy says automatically.

At the other end of the table, Maadi has an eggplant. “See, this is more of a _grower_ than a _shower_.”

“They’re all growers,” Capable says. “I mean, technically.”

Tamar smirks. “Still pretty showy.”

Fresh produce is a welcome luxury after months and months of bean bars and hard, dry cakes, but _dear god_ , Max thinks, at what cost.


End file.
